HOWGREJ@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (05/03/90)
With regard to the postings a few days ago about leaving the system on, someone said that for a few hours or so, it should be left on since powerdown/ powerup is so stressful. The problem I have with this is the hard drive. What I'm really wondering is if its possible to install a switch to turn off the hard drive, leaving the rest of the system on, when it won't be in use for a while. For example, if I won't be doing anything major for a while, but maybe easy calculations or quick notes, I should not need to have the HD churning all this time, particulary if I can get away with using a RAMdrive for most simple stuff. Is this feasible? Is it too stressful on the HD? My HD is a middling-junky Seagate and I don't want to leave it on for extended periods if I can help it (particularly seeing as how HD lives are rated by power-on hours). I think that leaving the system on and the HD off for many applications is, at first glance, a good way to run a system. Anyone have any experience with this sort of thing? Can I ust shut off the HD, or do I need to set a lot of lines first (I doubt this, otherwise how culd I just kill the power. Still, the PC probably needs certain lines reading certain levels). Any info or discussion would be appreciated... What she said: "I smoke 'cos I'm | Greg Howard hoping for an early death" - The Smiths | HOWGREJ@YALEVM
JXS118@psuvm.psu.edu (Jeff Siegel, Op from Atherton Hall) (05/03/90)
In article <90123.034406HOWGREJ@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu>, HOWGREJ@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu says: > >With regard to the postings a few days ago about leaving the system on, >someone said that for a few hours or so, it should be left on since powerdown/ >powerup is so stressful. The problem I have with this is the hard drive. >What I'm really wondering is if its possible to install a switch to turn off >the hard drive, leaving the rest of the system on, when it won't be in use for >a while... I've seen this discussion go by sometime before. I think the conclusion was that it would be a good idea for the hard disk but is too hard to do because DOS/BIOS/HARDWARE of the rest of the system can't support it. Jeff